Challenges ahead for the next government of East Timor

Tackling uneven development will be another challenge. A little known economic study commissioned by former Prime Minister Alkatiri one month before the 2006 crisis indicates some significant socio-economic factors behind last year’s east - west tensions.

While all districts do poorly on key development indicators, the western districts fare slightly worse on food security, household wealth, literacy, and primary school education levels. On the other hand, displaced easterners dominate the refugee camps in Dili. Tackling these generational and regional fault lines will be a key task for the incoming administration.

The final challenge is justice. There have been grave concerns over a culture of impunity for past crimes in East Timor, combined with the sense that senior political figures were above the law, and the evident fact that security forces had been politicised.

Fretilin now appears to be laying the groundwork for some of its own figures implicated in the crisis to be pardoned, with new clemency legislation for those convicted of crimes other than murder. Unopposed in the parliament, the new act will pass into law unless vetoed by President Ramos-Horta. A new coalition government may not overturn the legislation if their own political associations, such as those with alleged “hit squad” leader Rai Los, currently campaigning for CNRT, compromise them. Such an outcome can only serve to reinforce popular mistrust of the justice system.

The 2006 crisis should warn future governments to remain accountable and responsive, to encourage participation and inclusion, and to strongly police the border between ruling party and state - areas for which Fretilin has been justly criticised, and recently punished by voters.

It would be a tragedy for all East Timorese, and the next government, if other lessons were taken from the crisis: that armed defiance is an acceptable means of opposing an elected government (provided one claims to be “defending the people”), that gangs are a handy resource for warring factions of the political elite, or that international intervention is an achievable aim for disaffected groups seeking to capitalise on political instability.

Though any number of justifications may be offered in relation to the crisis of 2006, and some may be persuasive, these are generally features of underground resistance, not of democratic opposition.